INDIA’S REVOLUTION 


By 


SAILENDRA NATH GHOSE 


RR URS ARON ee SR REELS 


Sailendra nath Ghose, M.Sc. (Calcutta) was 
formerly on the staff of the Caleutta University Col- 
lege of Science for Post-Graduate Studies. In 1916 
he obtained the Sir IT. N. Palit fellowship of the 
University of Calcutta at Harvard. Two days 
before he should have left India he was refused a 
Passport on account of his interest in the movement 
for independence. He escaped to the United States 
in 1917. In 1918 he was arrested in New York and 
was kept in the Tombs for ten months on $25,000 
bail. He is now a political refugee in New York, 
in danger of deportation. 


Reprinted from THE DIAL of June 14, 1919 
By 


THE FRIENDS OF FREEDOM FOR INDIA 
Room 601, 7 East 15th St., New York City 


Price 5 Cents 


THE DIAL 


India’s Revolution 


I N THE LIGHT of the evolutionary growth of revo- 
lutions and their constant approach to more ideal 
goals, it is of extreme interest to estimate the sig- 
nificance of the present revolution in India. ‘This 
revolution has come out of desperation, and to the 
goal of absolute freedom it must go. Whether it 
succeeds now or not, it has already contributed a 
new and radical idea to the progress of humanity, 
which will be a permanent gift to international 
thought. ‘This contribution comes, perhaps, nearer 
the goal of idealism than that of any other revolu- 
tion, because the contribution is that highly ideal- 
istic and inspiring one of passive resistance. 

In its inception, the Indian revolution was passive 
in character. “Though in the latter stages it lost 
its original character and switched towards active 
resistance, yet it never lost sight of the spirit of 
passivism. Even the recourse to violence, forced 
upon the people by the British government, was 
more a protest against brutalities and barbarities 
committed on the unarmed and unfed masses by the 
alien autocrats. It was adopted only when they 
were not allowed to voice their silent protest against 
the alien laws that legalize and perpetuate the en- 
‘slavement of themselves—one-fifth of humanity. 

The desire for freedom has been growing stronger 
and stronger day by day. In 1917 the British 
authorities recognized the revolutionary tendencies 
by the appointment of the Rowlatt Commission to 
investigate revolutionary conspiracies in India. By 
this act alone they acknowledged the invalidity of 
their title to rule India against the will of her 315 
millions of people. In 1919, drivea to desperation 
by the continued growth of the revolutionary move- 
ment, the Government introduced the infamous 
Rowlatt Bills and had them passed against the 
unanimous voice of the Indian members of the Legis- 
lature Council who are, of course, in the minority. 
These Rowlatt Acts. revived the Spanish Inquisition 
and the Star Chamber of the Tudor and Stuart 
period, in their worst forms. According to their 
provisions: 


1. Any Indian is subject to arrest without trial, upon 
suspicion, and detention without trial for an unlimited 
duration of time. 


2. The burden of proof rests upon the accused. 


3. The accused is kept ignorant of the names of his 
accusers and of witnesses against him. The accused is 
not confronted with his accusers or with witnesses against 
him, and is entitled only to a written account of the 
offenses attributed to him. 


4. The accused is deprived of the help of a lawyer, and 
no witnesses are allowed in his defense. 


5. The accused is given a secret trial, before a Com- 
mission of three High Court Judges, who may sit at any 
place they deem fit—in a cellar if they choose. The 
method of their procedure or their findings may not be 
made public. 


6. Trial by jury is denied. The right of appeal is 
denied. “No order under this Act shall be called into 
question in any court, and no suit or prosecution or other 
legal proceeding shall be made against any person for 
anything which is in good faith done or intended to be 
done under this Act.” 


7. The accused may be convicted of an offense with 
which he is not charged. 


8. The prosecution “shall not’ be bound to observe the 
rules of the law of evidence.” Prosecution may accept 
evidence of absent witnesses. The witnesses may be dead, 
or may never have existed. | 


9. The authorities are given power to use 
every means” 
confessions. 


“any and 
in carrying out the law and in obtaining 
In other words, torture. 


10. Any person possessing “seditious” documents, pic- 
tures or words, intending that the same shall be pub- 
lished or circulated, is liable to arrest and imprisonment. 
According to the definition of “sedition,” absence of 
affection for the British Government would be cea 
held to mean disaffection against it. 


11. Men who have served prison terms for political 
offenses may be restricted to certain specific areas, must 
report regularly to the police, cannot change address with- 
out notification of authorities, and must give securities 
for good behavior. They can never thereafter write on 
or discuss or attend meetings on any subject of public im- 
portance including even social, religious, and educational. 


12. Any person (even the family) voluntarily associat- 
ing with an ex-political prisoner may be arrested and 
imprisoned. 


13. Search without warrant of any suspected place or 
home is provided for. 


The people of India, led by that great passive 
resistance advocate, Mr. M. K. Gandhi, and that 
spirited soul, Mrs. Sarojini Naidu, raised their voice 
of protest by observing the 6th of April as a national 
Day of Humiliation and Prayer: All over India 
shops were shut and general mourning was observed 
as a silent protest against the passage of the Rowlatt 
Bills. But undue interference of. the authorities 
prevented them from even making a passive demon- 
stration of protest. Shops were opened at the point 
of bayonets, passive resistance leaders were kid- 
napped and transferred to unknown destinations, 
and, according to the London Herald, twelve per- 
sons in one city were flogged for destroying govern- 
ment notices. 


For a nimber of days following the Day of 
Humiliation and Prayer, the country was quiet. 
But suddenly, on April 11, the whole of India, 


THE DIAL 


from Bombay to Calcutta and from Kashmir to 
Madras, went on a general strike. That day wit- 
nessed the greatest display of passivism the world 
has ever seen. People threw themselves in front 
of tram cars and moving trains, and succeeded in 
their attempts to induce their fellow-workers to stop 
work. ‘They refrained from picketing and all other 
direct action. 

This extreme passive renunciation, the like of 
which is not to be found in the history of any 
country, brought in that extraordinary unanimity 
among all classes and all creeds. High and low, 
rich and poor, Hindu and Parsee, Mohammedan 
and Brahmin, were solidly united against the foreign 
rulers, for the emancipation of their Motherland. 
Hindus went to Moslem mosques and prayed along 
with their Mohammedan comrades in the orthodox 
Mohammedan style; and the Mohammedans went 
to the Hindu temples and prayed in the orthodox 
Hindu style, clasping the hands of their Hindu 
brothers as they knelt, praying for the same great 
ideal—the freedom of India. Such a thing as this 
is unique; it is possible only in India where freedom 
of toleration for differences of opinion exists in 
practice, and is not a dead letter. This fraterniza- 
tion of two widely different religious sects is ai 
contribution to the real civilization which is to 
come, and India is well proud of it. Though the 
revolution may be suppressed by sheer brute force, 
still this contribution will live through all time. 

Even with this fraternization the British officials 
interfered. Mosques and ‘Temples were ordered 
closed and surrounded by police and military guards. 
- The people were forced to disperse by fire from 
machine guns and bombs from aeroplanes—the 
“civilized? weapons of Christian nations. _ 

Naturally, as might have been expected in any 
other country, passive protest of the masses was 
ineffective, and the people, losing patience, resorted 
to active methods, “They began destroying banks 
and 'postoffices, demolishing government buildings, 
destroying bridges and means of communication, 
blowing up railway trains carrying troops to kill 
them, and attacking Englishmen. All this was by 
way of open challenge to the right of alien domina- 
tion and economic exploitation. 

It was at this juncture that Mr. M. K. Gandhi 
called upon the people participating in the passive 
resistance movement to refrain from all further acts 
of violence, declaring that attacks upon Englishmen 
and other lawless acts constituted a blot on the 
movement for which the people should atone. He 
then fixed three days for fasting in atonement for 
acts of violence. And, according to the London 
Times for April 25, his followers did three days 
fasting as “‘ penance.” 


But the situation was out of control. It became 
so serious that the Governor General, on the 14th 
of April, announced in unmistakable terms, that he 
was “ satisfied that a state of open rebellion ” existed 
in India. ‘Thereafter, Mr. Gandhi retired from 
the field, and the moderate elements—the Home 
Rulers—rallied to the side of the Government and 
denounced the movement, thus repeating the history 
of the Russian Revolution of 1905. 

New India, however, had tasted of the cup of 
freedom and went on its march toward emancipa- 
tion. By the 20th of the month nearly half of the 
entire country was placed under martial law. The 
following day the Governor General issued an ordi- 
nance ordering deportation to the Andaman Islands 
for ‘life, or the extreme form of punishment, for 
political suspects tried under martial law. He for- 
bade the publication of all newspapers except those 
first passed upon and censored by government 
agents. 


Following the martial law order, all news from 
India, meager as it had always been, ceased. It 
was not until the Afghans on the northwestern 
frontier invaded India on the 9th of May that any 
news was permitted to reach America. The news 
stated that the Afghans were guarding the Khyber 


and Bolan passes, the only two passes connecting 


India with Afghanistan, and through Afghanistan 
with Russia. The Afghans further sent a mission to 
Moscow, thereby violating the treaty of 1880, by 
which the British had forced them to relinquish 
their right to treat independently with other 
nations. 

These facts are especially significant when we 
consider that the Afghans were supplied with ma- 
chine guns, apparently from some European source, 
and that Hindu revolutionists have been stationed 
in Moscow working with the Russian Socialist 
Government since November, 1917. Furthermore, 
an article published in the Bombay Times of 
April 15th stated that the Bolsheviki had forwarded 
£25,000 sterling to Bombay. The same paper 
quoted a telegram from Helsingfors, in March, 
predicting the outbreak. 

News coming from India at the present time is 
very meager. But this is certain: the revolution is 
on, as also are the massacres perpetrated by the 
British on the masses—atrocities compared with 
which German barbarities in Belgium sink to 
nothingness. ‘These atrocities are carried on by the 
very power which has been given the “ mandatory ” 
of practically half the habitable world by the con- 
ference of old diplomats sitting at Versailles. This 
much is also certain: Britain will sacrifice much of 
that habitable area before she will give up India. 


THE DIAL 


She will give China to Japan, she will give up 
many of her other possessions, but desperate and 
bleeding India, and the route leading to India, she 
will hold by every means from diplomacy to liquid 
fire and poison gas. 


Whatever the outcome of the present revolution, 
India has shown that it is not lagging behind any 
other nation in idealism and radicalism. The 
Hindus and Mohammedans have been cemented by 
the closest ties. Younger India has shown to the 
world what it desires and what it must have for 
self-existence. India has determined what it needs 
and it is also determined to get it. The people 
will not adopt violent means simply for the sake 
of violence. By birth and by heritage they abhor 
it, In practice as well as in theory. But if their 
passive efforts are met by active and brutal opposi- 
tion, they will not hesitate to adopt those measures 


for the time being, to smash to pieces all civilized 


Christian methods of subjection, and to smash them 
once for all. | 

In idealism and radicalism India is not inferior 
to the inspired idealists of other countries. In 
some parts of the country the people are attempting 
to adopt communal ownership of land and property, 
and to revive their indigenous democratic village 
community system. “They have succeeded in a few 
sections, such as in the Punjab, where the revolution 
has gained a strong foothold. The official press 
states that the “ fanatical * Hindus are demanding 
expropriation of landlords, and communal owner- 
ship and control of the earth! It is true that these 
‘illogical’ and simple Hindus have always held 
that the land belongs to the people, and now they 
are determined to see that this becomes a reality. 
The social and economic ideals of the people to the 
north of the Himalayas are not new to the Hindus. 

SAILENDRA NATH GHOSE. 


